Obama Proves the Pundits Wrong
by Randy Shaw‚
Oct. 06‚ 2008
After Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses by a surprisingly large margin, the punditocracy was troubled. Pundits had virtually conceded the nomination to Hillary Clinton, and now went into high gear explaining the Illinois Senator’s deficiencies. They told us Obama would have problems winning white working class voters, Jews, Latinos, women, and, as absurd as it now sounds, African-Americans. He supposedly alienated voters in Michigan and Florida by not agreeing in the spring to seat all of their delegates. Pundits said Obama was too inexperienced on foreign policy, lacked management experience, and would be chewed up in debates with the wily John McCain. Obama was said to be too “cool” to connect viscerally to middle-class voters, and was unable to “feel” their pain. Some pundits even publicly expressed what others were saying privately--- that many voters would never support a black man for President. A month before Election Day, Obama has proved the pundits wrong on every count. He is now on track for the largest victory by a Democratic nominee since 1964, sending a powerful message to activists and candidates not to allow their dreams to be derailed by the crushing force of conventional wisdom.
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The City of Oakland Needs a Bailout
by Yvonne Martinez‚
Oct. 06‚ 2008
Replete with a three horn band, umbrella toting union protesters wore wide brim black church hats in a New Orleans style funeral to mourn the death of City Services at the City of Oakland last Tuesday. The several hundred person procession lead by SEIU Local 1021 moved in and around Oakland City hall and carried signs that read “Save Our City” “Save Our Services.”
Before a packed City Council Chamber, City of Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums presented a budget that would eliminate 84 jobs and drastically cut services in the already economically distressed City. “700 billion is being given to bail out Wall Street,” said Oakland resident and SEIU 1021 Union President, Damita Davis-Howard. “We’re about to be devastated. Where is the Bailout for the needy of Oakland?”
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Guest Editorial: Why San Francisco Opposes JROTC and Prop V
by Marko Matillano and Alan Lessik‚
Oct. 06‚ 2008
Progressives have always opposed JROTC in high schools, and with good reason: JROTC is a military recruitment tool. An effective one at that since nationally 40-50% of kids who join JROTC end up in the military at some point after they graduate. There are no stats on local JROTC enlistment into the military; a member of the No on Prop V campaign has made a Public Records Act request to the SF Unified School District. And the District indicated that they do not keep records on how many students end up in the military after high school. Any claim otherwise is an outright lie and should be dismissed as such. It speaks volumes for the Pro V argument if, like the invasion of Iraq, it is premised on a lie.
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Tens of Thousands of Blind Americans Object to the Movie ‘Blindness’
by American Council of the Blind‚
Oct. 03‚ 2008
WASHINGTON -- Residents of an unnamed city suddenly and mysteriously go blind in the movie “Blindness,” scheduled for release on Friday, Oct. 3. The dehumanizing, animalistic way that blind people are portrayed in this movie has blind people across the United States angry. Some are even organizing picket lines and waging protests at theaters where the movie is being shown. “The movie ‘Blindness’ is a demeaning depiction of people's reactions to losing their eyesight," stated Mitch Pomerantz, president of the American Council of the Blind. Dr. Ronald E. Milliman, a blind university professor and also a member of the ACB, says, "In a very mythical sense, something like what is being shown in the movie might have happened hundreds or thousands of years ago, but certainly not in any civilized society such as what we have in the United States today. The movie is at best totally misleading, and at worst serves to frighten deeply those who see it."
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Nate Silver on Credibility Problems in Polling
by Nate Silver‚
Oct. 03‚ 2008
(Ed note: If you do not read Nate Silver to follow presidential polling data, you are really missing out. His October 2 piece on Real Clear Politics was particularly illuminating and we include it below)
Last week, I discussed Real Clear Politics' decision to exclude the Research 2000 daily tracking poll from their national averages. After a lengthy discussion with RCP founder John McIntyre, I decided to defend them, pointing out that while RCP may have a debatable framework for deciding which polls they do or do not include, they at least appeared to have applied this framework consistently. My gut-level takeaway from my conversation with McIntyre was somewhat different from what I represented, however. My gut-level feeling was that RCP was in fact cherry-picking those results that were to its liking, and then coming up with post-facto rationalizations to justify its decisions.
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Little Britain Comes to America
by E. "Doc" Smith‚
Oct. 03‚ 2008
Last Sunday night, I watched with dread as one of my all-time favorite British comedies made it's debut on HBO. Like the successful "Extras" with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant before it, HBO has delved into the world of Brit-coms again, wisely bringing the geniuses of the original series with them. "Little Britain USA" is an American spinoff of the successful British BBC television series Little Britain. As in the British series, the show will mainly focus on characters played by Matt Lucas and David Walliams. With Tom Baker of Doctor Who fame reprising his role as narrator, I settled back for a half hour of some of the sickest comedy I have ever seen.
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The History Boys – A History Lesson you’ll never forget. -- “Powerful and moving!”; Fa—Lash! – Hot News!
by Buzzin' Lee Hartgrave‚
Oct. 03‚ 2008
THE HISTORY BOYS
The time is the eighties and eight young men at an English Prep School, are now hoping too gain admission to Cambridge or Oxford. There is a tight-assed ‘Head Master’ – who is determined to make sure that his students make the cut. One of the Teachers is Hector, who is a frumpy, older man. He believes that knowledge exists for the “glory” of knowing. Nothing else is needed. No written exams, just give the students the words. Hector, even has the students act out parts of movies, so that they can relate to his rather ‘different’ way of teaching.
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Supes Forward Landlord Bailout for Board Vote on October 21
by Randy Shaw‚
Oct. 02‚ 2008
The SF Board of Supervisors Land Use Committee has voted to send legislation granting landlords special rent increases for water charges to the full Board for an October 21 vote. Although some landlord groups have threatened to launch a mail campaign against Prop A, the San Francisco General Hospital bond, unless the Board passed the measure, no representatives of these groups even bothered to attend yesterday’s hearing. Instead, a flood of tenant advocates expressed anger at landlord attempts to blackmail the Board, while also questioning the policy basis for enacting a poorly-conceived measure that charges tenants for allegedly “excessive” water use. The Committee appeared to send the item to the full Board because they were tired of holding hearings, and wanted their colleagues to finally kill the measure.
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Guest Editorial: JROTC and the Left in San Francisco
by Michael Bernick‚
Oct. 02‚ 2008
I became involved with JROTC as director of the state employment department, the Employment Development Department, under Governor Gray Davis. JROTC proved to be an outstanding pre-employment and life skills program. My son William participated in JROTC at Washington High.
In this piece, I don’t want to address the reasons to support JROTC (Proposition V) or the San Franciscans who are supporting it. You can find this information on our website. Instead, I want to focus on three issues that have been raised most often by people on the left in San Francisco. We are actively seeking to build on the support we’ve already received from the Democratic left, especially support from the women’s community. [more]->
School Beat: Say What? SFUSD’s Painful Communication Gaps
by Lisa Schiff‚
Oct. 02‚ 2008
Communication. It’s the Achilles Heel of the San Francisco Unified School District (SFSUD). Even in a near-utopian world of full funding and an equitable distribution of education resources, it would be a safe bet that on any given matter parents and school communities in the SFUSD would still only be brought into conversations about our children as an afterthought. This is probably true of most school districts, but San Francisco is where we live, and San Franciscan’s demand more of their government.
October 6, 2008
